Reflecting on my Summer Internship by SRA Rising Star Rocio Gonzalez Melendez
My name is Rocio Gonzalez Melendez. I was raised in the Bay Area, in a small town called Novato. I am currently attending Whittier College and will be going into my final semester in-person as opposed to remote, which I have been highly anticipating. I am pursuing a degree in Business Administration with a minor in Organizational Leadership and a concentration in Marketing. My academic interests include understanding how and why people behave in certain ways, especially within the workplace and discovering new ways to reach people through strategic messaging.
This past summer I had the opportunity to intern virtually with Oracle Corporation. Oracle is one of the leading innovators in the tech industry, particularly for their compatible infrastructure and applications with over 4,000 product offerings. Oracle’s mission is to “ help people see data in new ways, discover insights, unlock endless possibilities.” The marketing program that I was accepted into is extremely competitive. There were 1,400 applicants and only 20 intern positions available. I was hired for the Global Marketing position for the HCM Pillar. I was fortunate to have a very progressive manager in the sense that she allowed me to select what I wanted to pursue all summer. It was up to me to decide how many projects I wanted to own, how I wanted to execute them, and who I needed to collaborate with across teams to make it happen.
The past two months of my summer have been full of valuable educational moments. I learned so much more about marketing than I could have by simply taking a course in a classroom setting. Part of my accelerated learning was thanks to the projects I was able to accomplish. To highlight a few, my first project was to write and publish a blog series for the HCM pillar on Oracle’s corporate website. In this two-part blog series, blog 1 focused on my perspective of DE&I and why all HR professionals should invest in this area. In blog 2, I cover the topic of Latinx representation in the tech industry with definitive call-to-action items we can all take. The second project I wanted to highlight were my efforts in creating an infographic which was used as a supporting asset to a campaign in the HCM pillar. I created a project plan for the deliverable and went through three phases to finalize the infographic. The three phases included content creation, design, and an execution of a promotional plan. This project served as an incredible learning experience, as it was my first ever infographic.
When I came into the intern position at Oracle, I had outlined a few goals for myself. Above all, my main goal was to explore the vast field of marketing and leave the internship
knowing what facets I truly enjoyed. I felt like I achieved this goal throughout my eight week employment because my projects exposed me to content creation, design and visual composition, strategic campaign messaging, campaign analytics, and campaign logistics. I know now that these areas of marketing are extremely fascinating to me and I am excited to continue my journey in learning more. Another goal I had was to create valuable connections with well seasoned professionals. I wanted to learn about others’ journeys to Oracle and pick their brain on advice for me, as an emerging professional. I am so grateful to everyone who took the time to speak with me because I truly felt like I received both useful industry knowledge and genuine advice.
I found this internship on my own and did not request any assistance from SRA but I would like to thank SRA for helping me become a confident emerging professional. It has been a long process to get to where I am now and SRA has definitely been an active contributor to my personal and professional development.
Blog Post written by SRA Rising Star, Rocio Gonzalez Melendez
